


Flower Shop

by dasyatidae



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: AU, Flowers, Fluff, M/M, Misunderstandings, Swearing, Valentine's Day, a Buffy reference that gets out of control, a meet cute, bikester artist Eames, crying-adverse begonias, flower arranging, flowers flowers flowers, fluffy fluff, imagined threesomes, just kidding there's actually a wee bit of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-14
Updated: 2017-02-14
Packaged: 2018-09-24 07:24:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9710972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dasyatidae/pseuds/dasyatidae
Summary: “Gonna buy the flowers myself,” Arthur mutters down at the cream-colored roses, trying to channel his inner Clarissa Dalloway.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Meltrix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meltrix/gifts).



> Happy Valentine's Day, bokvshi! I got you...flowers. Lots of flowers. :) 
> 
> Many, many thanks to my beta deinvati! <3

It’s the day before Valentine’s Day at ten past four in the afternoon.  
  
“Gonna buy the flowers myself,” Arthur mutters down at the cream-colored roses, trying to channel his inner Clarissa Dalloway. He can do this. He already has his eye on some spiky purple numbers and the tiny white ones that come in clusters.  
  
“Not a problem. You sure can,” the assistant says, appearing at his side with a smirk. “But I’m happy to help you if you want. Or you might ask _him_.” She gestures to a broad-shouldered man wearing a leather jacket over a screamingly bright yellow calico shirt. His jeans are rolled up on one leg like he’s just hopped off his bike, and he’s also stunningly, mind-breakingly gorgeous, with full lips and laughing eyes. “He’s got an uncanny ability to put together perfect bouquets. I swear, one of these days I’m going to show up and you’re just going to be working here,” she says to the man, who is now regarding them both with interest. Arthur gapes at him for one thunderclap of a moment and then averts his face in his usual ‘oh my God, you are hot, I can’t look at you’ praxis.  
  
“You still don’t know my name, do you?” the handsome man says to the shop assistant, his face showing more amusement than chagrin. “A year of running my credit card every week…”  
  
She rolls her eyes. “Oh dear, I implied that you’re special. I’m sorry I implied that you’re special. You are merely one of a faceless sea of regulars.”  
  
The man pulls a maudlin face.  
  
“Fine!” The assistant throws her hands in the air. She’s a diminutive young person with multiple ballpoint pens sticking out of the pockets of her apron and the knot of brown hair on top of her head, and her theatrics make Arthur smile. “I’ll sneak a peek at your receipt this time, jeez,” she says, ducking back around the tiered display of flowers. She disappears into a tiny, phone-booth-like enclosed part of the shop where the register and messes of electronics and ribbons live.  
  
Arthur gives the man his sympathetic ‘well, this is awkward because we have been sort of forced to interact’ grimace and prepares to get back to brooding over his flower options. It’s not that he’s a perfectionist, _really_ , it’s just that it’s a lovely, sunny day, warm for February even in California, and Arthur has the afternoon off work. He’s going to savor walking through his neighborhood, lingering over coffee, and buying the perfect bouquet of flowers.  
  
The handsome man grins at him and raises his eyebrows. “I am rather good,” he says.  
  
“I’m sorry?”  
  
He holds a large hand out to Arthur. “Eames. Good at flowers,” he clarifies.  
  
“Doesn’t that make you statistically more likely to be a psychopath?” Arthur asks, shaking his hand and forgetting to let go for a moment as Eames looks startled and then full-on laughs, his green eyes crinkling beautifully.  
  
“Hey, I heard that!” the diminutive florist hollers from somewhere behind the orchids.  
  
“I won’t murder you for your skin.” Eames drops Arthur’s hand.    
  
“Promises, promises,” Arthur says. “Also, that movie—ew.”  
  
Eames pauses, makes a face. “Right! Sorry.”  
  
Arthur shoves his hands in his coat pockets and feels silly. Talking to strangers is _hard_. If he had worn his headphones, he could have avoided the effort. And yet… “I suppose I could stand the risk to get a bit of assistance from someone with flower skills,” he says, voice more tentative than teasing, but he’s trying. “I’m not very good with colors.”  
  
Eames frowns at him and gives him an exaggerated once over, head to toe, appearing to linger on his perfectly styled hair and his meticulously clean sneakers that match the rest of his outfit. Arthur follows his gaze and looks down at the navy and green sweater that he’d picked out to wear with his black jeans and crisp gray coat. “Alright, I’m not aesthetically inept or terrible with colors, per se,” he says. “It’s more that I have a…limited palette. I get kind of lost with bright colors. Flower colors.”  
  
Eames steps closer. “I’m an artist,” he confides, holding out both his hands this time for Arthur’s examination. Arthur now notices that they’re smeared all over with different shades of…  
  
“Ochre and ultramarine,” Eames supplies helpfully. “And that’s burnt sienna there, the rusty bit.” He points to a squarish patch of red that stretches from his heart line to his life line.  
  
“I see.”  
  
“Colors and shapes—especially, um, petal-y, shapes—are my specialty.”  
  
Arthur surreptitiously checks his own hand to see if any of the paint has rubbed off on him. Luckily, no.  
  
Eames snorts. “It’s not like I don’t wash the worst of it off my hands before appearing in the world. Some of it really sinks into my flesh though and is impervious to scrubbing. Anyway, hello.”  
  
“Hello,” Arthur says, amused. “Don’t worry. I won’t murder you for your skin either. Even if it is better decorated than mine.”  
  
“Now who’s bringing it up…”  
  
“I know, yuck. Anyway…”  
  
Eames is beaming at him almost as if he does work here and is, in fact, trying to sell Arthur flowers—or sell him something, anyway. His teeth are crooked, but it’s actually kind of endearing on him, with the rest of his face so fucking perfect. Arthur mentally shakes himself. They’re buying Valentine’s Day flowers, after all; significant others are absent but implicit when one buys Valentine’s Day flowers. It’s not like it’s an appropriate setting for eye-fucking a stranger.  
  
Even if said stranger gives as well as he takes in the eye-fucking department.  
  
“So,” Arthur says, clearing his throat and turning back to the pink roses, which surely must inspire purer thoughts. “You come here every week. You must be quite the romantic.”  
  
“Oh yes,” Eames says, earnest. “Very much so. And you?”  
  
Having the question tossed back at him is somehow unexpected. Arthur frowns, considers. “I’m more of a special occasions kind of person when it comes to flowers. But I think it’s important to pick them out myself, you know? Last year, I was here on Valentine’s Day, and there was this huge line of guys waiting, just playing on their phones while the people who work here were running around like crazy putting bouquets together for them. I got kinda sad thinking about the people who were going to receive those impersonal flowers.”  
  
“Hmm. So you _are_ a romantic.”  
  
Arthur feels his face heat and hopes it’s not too visible. “I like to do things right is all.”  
  
“Admirable. So is the day before Valentine’s Day a special occasion for you and yours then?”  
  
He shakes his head. “These are the same flowers that’ll be here tomorrow, you know. Without the crowds or the rush.”  
  
“A practical romantic,” Eames murmurs. “I like it.”  
  
Arthur’s all tongue-tied, dammit. He clears his throat. “So are you going to help me with this or what?”  
  
“And re-enact your sad story about impersonal flowers? I wouldn’t dream of it. You choose the ones that speak to you, and I’ll, um, consult.”  
  
“So can I just—?” Arthur gestures to indicate touching the flowers.  
   
“Well, for that part you’d better let me—if Ariadne will. Ariadne?”  
  
The florist heaves a dramatic sigh that Arthur can hear from across the workspace. She’s standing in front of a long table fully under the shop awning, wrapping rose bouquets with tissue paper and ribbons in clear plastic sheaths. “Go ahead, usurper. I’m busy anyway. But I get the tip,” she instructs Arthur, pointing at him with a dark red rosebud, its petals tightly furled.  
  
“So you want some of those?” Eames asks, stealing back Arthur’s attention and reaching for the irises he’s been standing near.  
  
“No, those—the small pinkish ones—”  
  
Eames draws out three stems. “Good?”  
  
“With those purple spiky guys,” Arthur directs. “And—ah—one of those roses. If you think it won’t clash?”  
  
“Let’s see.”  
  
He tucks the stems together and holds them out for Arthur’s inspection. Arthur smiles. “They do go together.”  
  
“It’s lovely.”  
  
“You take direction well,” Arthur says, feeling pleased.  
  
“You give directions well, darling.”  
  
Arthur starts. “Doesn’t that epithet belong to someone else?”  
  
“Hmm. I don’t know. It fits you. But botanical setting and all, perhaps I’d better call you petal.”  
  
“How did you ever get someone to date you?” Arthur smiles wider in spite of himself. He shakes his head as Eames points questioningly at some daisies and indicates some fluffy white stalks—snapdragons? “You’re totally a goofball, you know that right?” The words out in the open, Arthur suddenly does wonder what kind of person is holding Eames’s interest—waking up to his cracky endearments, getting smeared with ultramarine during impromptu make out sessions in his studio, inspiring him to make weekly offerings of poppies and peonies and those spicy-smelling, fierce, yellow-petaled ones tagged Mexican Marigolds…  
  
It’s ridiculous, because he’s just met this man, and Arthur has a good life, filled with enough love. He does. But something about Eames gives Arthur French film feelings, makes Arthur want to drag him back to his apartment—or whatever well-lit, messy loft Eames must inhabit—to fuck him against a wall in the fading, late afternoon sun. Eames is making his quiet heart perk up from its cozy routines and wonder _what if_.  
  
While Arthur has been mooning, Eames has been talking animatedly, waving Arthur’s bouquet around this way and that to illustrate what’s certainly a shaggy-dog story. “So you see, I am eminently dateable,” he finishes with a wink.  
  
“That was a rhetorical question, by the way,” Arthur manages, dragging his thoughts back to the task at hand—to Eames’s hands—pretty, paint-smeared broad hands holding Arthur’s flowers for him. Okay. Breathe. Focus. Arthur squints and tries to gaze at the cluster of colors critically, tries to imagine what else it might _need_ to be complete. It looks good as it is. “So what kind of flowers are _you_ going to get?” he asks.  
  
Eames lights up. “You’re going to help me pick them out?”  
  
“I have time. I could…consult,” he says, very seriously, trying to will away his smile, which he fears at this point is starting to border on embarrassing.  
  
“Deal.”  
  
So they build together. A towering sunflower stalk, its face wider than Arthur’s fist, threatening to eclipse even taller stalks of indigo lupine and bluebells. Spiky, golden black-eyed-Susans. Smatterings of Queen Anne’s lace that incongruously trim orange bursts of marigolds. Arthur, caught up in the moment, keeps daring Eames to add more and more, waiting for some clash, but it just becomes more beautiful and monstrous, this bouquet. Eames is still holding Arthur’s flowers tucked at the crook of his elbow, and he snatches up stems that he’s drawn to and Arthur approves, and vice versa, then steps close to Arthur to place each one precisely in Arthur’s hands. The sun is bright, and Arthur is filled with gentle care, cradling their floral creation; pollen tickles his nose, Eames smells like paint and some unidentifiable, pretty cologne, and his fingers brush against Arthur’s wrists as he arranges the different stems in Arthur’s grasp.  
  
Finally Eames steps back and regards Arthur and the flowers in a way that makes Arthur’s pulse quicken; it’s a scanning, penetrating artist’s look, settling here and there on particular moments—perhaps the brush of the curling tip of a lupine stalk against Arthur’s earlobe, a spike of yellow bisecting a field of blue, dappled shadows on Arthur’s forearms where he’s pushed up his sleeves, where protruding leaves drip water on his skin and make him shiver.  
  
“I wish I painted portraits,” Eames sighs. “You’re perfect right now, in this light.”  
  
Arthur dimples for him; he can feel it.  
  
“And it looks like these flowers might try to eat you.” He steps very close again and minutely adjusts the tickling lupine, his fingers stroking the skin just behind Arthur’s ear. Arthur gasps. “I like a bit of danger in a painting, you know? What do you say, will you come be my model?”  
  
“I’m awful at sitting still,” Arthur manages, voice weak. “I fidget.”  
  
“Is that so?”  
  
Arthur’s got to pull himself together. Like, what is he _doing_ , helping this strange, handsome man pick out flowers for his probably super hot boyfriend, letting a bit of flirting turn him into a quivering mess in need of an immediate wank? Eames’s boyfriend probably isn’t even the jealous type. Eames’s boyfriend probably thinks this kind of purring flirtation, this kind of _show_ , is charming at parties. Eames’s boyfriend will probably laugh tomorrow, caressing a velvet marigold, and ask Eames why he didn’t bring Arthur home with the flowers, a real Valentine’s Day present. And they’ll laugh and tease as they strip each other down and fuck, just drowning in contentment and orgasms and Kunderian lightness, while Arthur’s at home dealing with—  
  
“What do you say, darling?” Eames asks, his bedroom eyes dark with intent, that gorgeous mouth curving into a knowing smile.  
  
The tableau of Eames and his lover shatters in Arthur’s head, leaving him with a sense of loss and unease. It’s what he wishes he had—that lightness, that sense of play and easy adoration. He wants it in the center of his life, like marrow in his bones, air in his lungs. He doesn’t want an empty flirtation at a flower shop.  
  
The giant bouquet is heavy to hold. One of these days, Arthur will manage his life better, make it different. But not today, he knows. Somehow, today is never his day.  
  
He sighs and steps back, away from Eames. “I can’t. I’m sorry.” His voice sounds awful and stiff, he thinks, observing himself from far away in the cage of his whirring, doubting thoughts. “You better take your flowers back to your…you know. I wouldn’t want to…and I should take mine and get home to…” He trails off with a shrug.    
  
And he’s done it. He’s broken the mood.  
  
“Right,” Eames says. “Of course.” Arthur watches his demeanor become more formal, less playful and fond, as he hands Arthur the flowers with grave ceremony and reclaims his own towering bouquet. “Ariadne will wrap them for you. They’re lovely,” he says again, voice soft. “You shouldn’t doubt your eye for color. I’m sure your beau will think they’re stunning.”  
  
“I’m sure _your beau_ will be happy with yours,” Arthur grits out, trying not to crush the flower stalks in his fist. They’re wet and cold and just a little slimy.  
  
Arthur stares at a random section of the shop display—a clump of cream, yellow, orange, and pink flowers, a whole spectrum of watercolor-soft, hot colors shaped like roses at their most full-blown—while Eames makes his purchase and leaves. Arthur doesn’t let himself look up to watch him go.  
  
“Please don’t weep on the begonias,” the shop assistant says, materializing by his side again with an armful of tulips that she deftly distributes into vases. “They’re fragile.”  
  
“This little sign says that they can last up to two weeks.”  
  
“In the right conditions. Proximity to weepiness makes them fail to thrive.”  
  
“Har har.”  
  
“Seriously, begonias are widely considered to be a cheerful flower. I’ve never seen someone stare so forlornly at them.”  
  
“You run a flower shop.”  
  
“Alright, yeah, I’m lying. People cry here all the time.” She frowns. “When I applied to work here, I thought _happy_ people bought flowers.”  
  
Arthur holds his flowers out to her and bares his teeth in a very forced, wide grin. “I’m ready to pay for these.”  
  
She narrows her eyes, steps away from him decisively. “Wow, that’s just…wow. Keep smiling like that and you’ll convince me that you do murder people to wear their skin.”  
  
“That movie is so fucking transphobic. Can we stop talking about it?”  
  
She frowns. “Huh. Yeah. You’re totally right. I’m sorry.”  
  
Arthur hands her his flowers. The way Eames has gathered them together is just right. They’re heartbreaking flowers. How is he supposed to take them home now? His heart’s still beating fast, a skittish tattoo of _what just happened, what, what, what_ , and it’s taking real effort to wrench himself back to the reality of Monday, to polite conversation and commercial transactions. He should have worn his fucking headphones, dammit, and skipped this whole bizarre episode.  
  
“I bet you’re not actually big on happy people. Like, obnoxiously happy people.”  
  
“You caught me. I’m here for the bathos,” the assistant says. Arthur follows her to her work table, which is spread with different colored papers and ribbons. “Have a preference?” she asks.  
  
“Not really.”  
  
“What’s your sweetie’s favorite color?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Your boyfriend? Girlfriend?” She squints at him. “Secret crush? Spouse? The special person to whom you’re about to give these special flowers?”  
  
Arthur fights the urge to literally facepalm and settles for running his hands through his hair. “I’m single,” he says finally. “Can’t a guy buy himself flowers for his apartment without an inquisition? Is it so hard to fathom that I might want something bright and pretty to take the edge off the crushing helplessness and panic that I’m feeling watching our fake democracy crumble into unabashed totalitarianism? _Jesus._ ”  
  
She stares at him. “But it’s _Valentine’s Day_.”  
  
“It’s the day before Valentine’s Day.” Arthur snaps. “Okay, fine. They’re Valentine’s Day flowers. That I am buying for myself. I am pathetic. Are you happy now? Just tie them up with the purple ribbon, please. It doesn’t fucking matter.”  
  
They are both quiet for a moment.  
  
“You know Eames isn’t seeing anybody either, right?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“He was also buying flowers for himself.”  
  
Arthur’s mind kind of explodes as he replays the last thirty or so minutes and the universe rearranges itself. “But how do you know?” he asks.  
  
She rolls her eyes. “Because I _know_ him. He’s a regular. He paints pictures of flowers. He buys flowers here every week. To _paint._ ” She ties the purple ribbon around the tissue-wrapped flowers with a flourish and then curls the ribbon lightly with the edge of her scissors. “Also, I am nosy, and I asked him while you were sniffling into the begonias over there.”  
  
“For the last time, I was not—you know what, never mind. I’ve got to go,” Arthur says.  
  
“Yeah, yeah.” She shoves the bouquet at him. “Better run. He’s fast on that bike. Try the coffee shop two blocks down!” she yells after him as he dashes off, flowers clutched protectively against his chest. “And hey! Don’t forget! You owe me twenty-five dollars!”  
  
Flowers are fucking expensive, Arthur thinks as he jogs down the sidewalk, darting around strollers and dog walkers, his messenger bag thumping against his hip. He narrowly avoids an emasculating death-by-RAV-4 as he rushes into the crosswalk. The coffee shop is on the corner, and an assortment of little red tables spills out its doors onto the sidewalk. Eames has his flowers tucked into his backpack, the bright sunflower and lupine spines sticking out the top between the zippers, and he’s bending to unlock his bike from the bike rack. Arthur almost gets hit by another car—a BMW this time—as he stops in his tracks to admire Eames’s ass.  
  
“This is a pedestrian crosswalk, you rich fuck!” he yells at the car.  
  
By the time he’s finished staring down the driver, Eames has straightened up and is watching Arthur. Arthur walks up to him, nervous, palms sweating around the flowers’ plastic wrap. He hasn’t thought through this part, what will happen now.  
  
“Hostile is a good look on you, darling,” Eames murmurs, looking cautious but undeniably happy that Arthur is here in front of him, panting and awkward and intense with _want_.  
  
“The gal at the flower shop told me that you’re not seeing anyone.”  
  
Eames swallows. “That’s correct. And I take it you’re, ah, also not—”  
  
Arthur shoves the flowers at him. “Date me. I mean, go on a date with me. Fuck.”  
  
Eames inhales sharply; he takes the proffered flowers with gentle hands and looks admiringly from them to Arthur. “These are for me?”  
  
Arthur closes his eyes briefly, then nods. “Who else?”    
  
Eames has stepped forward into his space, and they’re standing nearly nose to nose, so close, close enough to…  
  
“If you’d like to kiss me now,” Arthur breathes. “That would be…acceptable.”  
  
“Oh, petal.” Eames’s free hand is on Arthur’s waist, pulling him closer. He kisses Arthur, and _those lips_ , oh, Arthur melts.

  
  
Around them, coffee shop patrons sigh into their lattes with dreamy smiles.


End file.
